There are many sizes and designs for reactors for converting reactants to desirable intermediates and final products. Chemical engineers expend many hours designing reactor systems to optimize reactor production considering pressure, temperature, flow rates, catalyst cost, reaction kinetics along with balancing many other issues and concerns.
It is generally understood that a generally uniform distribution of reactants in a catalyst reactor is preferred to avoid hot spots and to avoid the underutilization of catalyst in the reactor. Many inlet designs have been created to improve the distribution of reactants within reactors such as where the reactants are vaporous and have higher velocities along the outside of a bend in the piping leading to the reactor. In a reactor arrangement that is fed by a conduit with a significant bend leading into the top or bottom of a reactor, the higher velocities tend to follow the outside of the bend and concentrate along one side of the reactor. Baffles and vanes have been used for years to create back pressure on the inlet stream and cause the reactants to distribute themselves across the reactor.
Another common technique is to provide an inert support bed with a thick layer of inert support that create tortuous paths to the catalyst and causing mixing and back pressure to create a level of balance across the body of the reactor.
What is desired is a technique for creating a balanced distribution of the reactants across a rector body without significantly enlarging the size of the reactor and without creating significant back pressure on the flow of reactants.